If India is to continue on its economic growth path, water is essential. The Ganga basin has 40 per cent of India’s cultivable area. Seized of this matter, the country is in the process of developing 150,000 MW of hydropower and has plans to double it in the next few years.

Isolated studies show that out of the 7-8 glaciers monitored across the world, the Himalayan glaciers are retreating the fastest. There is an urgent need to know more about the Himalayan water system. For regional climate models on the plains, temperature and rainfall over land is sufficient but for higher elevations, it is the cryogenic storage of snow and ice that assumes vital importance.

The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) had recommended 10 to 40 Met stations at every 10,000 sq km in the Himalayas, but in India, the number of Met stations is less than one for this area. Experts have now begun to realise that this is inadequate for a mountain range that sustains almost half of the population of the world. Problem is, security and political concerns have dominated over scientific concerns so far.

The third assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) had precise predictions on other basins, but the Himalayas continued to remain fuzzy. The broad estimates said the following: increased temperatures would mean decreasing amounts of snow and ice, increased precipitation with a longer wet season, drier dry season, more high intensity rainfall events and changes in the sediment regime. It pointed to climatic zones shifting, asking for more adaptation. And it is going to be different for every basin.

... contd.